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Saturday, 25 January 2014

Nick Griffin: A Far-right Foodie

An overlooked culinary genius?

As a food blogger, I feel it's my job to like food. And I do. But I'm not sure I'd claim that food is an effective cure for the side effects of bad government. Yet that is precisely what bankrupt BNP leader Nick Griffin does in a video cunningly entitled Recipe for beating the Tory blues for the far-right party’s TV channel. I suppose if you’ve got no chance of actually influencing policy, you might as well showcase your abject culinary skills on YouTube.

In what some homecooks might see as a clear affront to Jamie Oliver’s 15/30 Minute Meals output, Griffin takes up over half an hour of my time (surely no one else watched it in full?) to advise his viewers on how to cook what is a relatively simple meal: a beef stew. Judging by the looks of despair on his guests’ faces and their disingenuous feedback - one bloke merely laughs awkwardly rather than give any opinion at all - I don’t think he should quit his day j...oh wait, no I do.

So what’s in this dish, apart from diluted anti-Tory sentiment? It’s “traditional British fare” says Griffin, with such notable additions as onions (originated in central Asia), carrots (arose in the Mediterranean) and potatoes (they came from South America). Interestingly, etymologically, onion comes from the Latin for “oneness” or “unity”, unio, so could be crowned ‘least xenophobic of vegetables’. Of course, these ingredients were all grown in Britannia, that 'green & pleasant Land', but I guess the point I’m making is: what the hell does 'British' even mean, Nick?

With the vegetables I’m nitpicking, but Griffin’s decision to include Tabasco sauce seems like a undeniable slight on ‘Britishness’. Hot red pepper sauce in a beef stew. It’s like Nicolas Anelka 'quenelle-ing' Woody Allen. Perhaps Griffin got the idea from the local Mexican: “We’ve got a Mexican restaurant in a town not far from here. The place isn’t swamped with Mexicans,” he says. Not swamped, you say? Maybe because the Mexican population in Britian is miniscule.

All in all, the video shows that there’s really no need to undermine Nick Griffin; he does a good enough job of it on his own. He talks about scrimping and saving, making a stew with dog bones (that is to say, bones destined to be eaten by dogs) from the butchers if needs must, to a backdrop of what most would consider a plush kitchen, Aga and all. He advocates taking photos of recipes in bookshops rather than buying cookbooks. (I wonder whether only indigenous Brits are allowed to do this in Griffin’s mind? Maybe Muslim offenders would magnanimously be offered voluntary resettlement). He even goes so far as to deny the very existence of pork stock cubes. Knorr will be most displeased.

Just imagine if other politicians got in on the act. We could have Ian Duncan Smith telling us how it really is possible to cook affordable, nutritous meals on state benefits of £53 a week, but fail to show us how. George Osborne would teach us all the meaning of austerity: how to make a burger with shattered dreams while he jaunts off to Byron post-filming. David Cameron would charm us with recipes for the 'real' Eton Mess and street food Kolkata-style, while declaring GM-food to be the right way. Nick Clegg would make a cameo but not cook anything, like a guest judge on The Taste. And, as a sign of the coalition's manifest cruelty, Ed Miliband would be forced to eat the leftovers of all the aborted meals until he vomited.